Israel and the US outsourced the siege of Gaza to Athens last summer by preventing 8 boats in the Freedom Flotilla 2-Stay Human from sailing from Greek ports to Gaza. Despite this we were able to bring world-wide attention to the blockade of the Gaza Strip. Our efforts in Greece only fueled our determination to challenge the imprisonment of the people of Gaza. We said we would continue to sail and so we are!!!

At this moment, two boats are in international waters in the Mediterranean heading to Gaza. One boat, the Saoirse from Ireland, includes parliamentarians among its passengers. The other, the Tahrir, carries representatives from Canada, the U.S., Australia, and Palestine.

The U.S. Representative on the Tahrir, Kit Kittredge, was a passenger on the U.S. Boat to Gaza, The Audacity of Hope mission in Athens in July. A journalist from Democracy Now is on the Tahrir also. Civil society organizations in Gaza await their arrival, and look forward to the delivery of letters collected from thousands of U.S. supporters in the To Gaza With Love campaign.

Thank you from all of us who wish we were in your company but are with you in spirit and in solidarity for human rights, freedom, liberty and justice for Gaza and our Palestinian brothers and sisters! Our prayers are with you!

The map tiles are generated from OpenStreetMap data, which is maintained by a community of people. The boundaries and names on these tiles are very problematic. The landmasses are black to obscure these problems as much as possible, but some boundaries couldn’t be fixed or removed.

For political maps, none of the online options are satisfactory, so I went with the ones that I could more easily modify.

We’re working on developing map tiles that would be appropriate. We’re also looking to include locations of destroyed villages and other elements that will hopefully benefit our readers and other sites who want to use it. Look for this early in 2012 and get in touch if you want to help!

Good luck to you all on board the freedom boats. A wave of good-will goes with you. The Palestinian people have suffered too much for too long. Yours is a creative, peaceful protest. It deserves to succeed.

Since they were taken off the air, I have been looking for updates, but unsucessfully... however, I notice that after half an hour break they send again coordinates out and seem to still move in the right direction (although much slower then before). Can anyone confirm my interpretation??